Try to imagine your family living in a village, alone and isolated. Without a neighborhood to call on, how would your family develop relationships? Do you think you can survive in such a lonely environment? Do you think it is important to belong to a community and establish ties with others?
First, its really hard to imagine living alone, isolated, without a neighborhood to call on. People may survive in such a lonely environment but finds emptiness in his/her self. Each one longs to live with someone close, of course aside from living within a family. Each one needs a neighbor to relate to, to establish relationships with. Oftentimes, our neighbors are our refuge in moments of great need. They are the people we can call and count on for support. But is this the only meaning of neighbor? Whom do we really consider our neighbors today?
In all cultures, we categorize people according to "outsiders" and "insiders." Let us take an exampe the Jews, for them neighbors were the members of Israel, their own people, dignified for sharing the same religion. For instance, a Jew could not charge any interest when lending money to a Jew who they consider as brother, but he could do so when lending money to a foreigner.
In our modern societies, certain laws are applicable to the citizens of a country, but not to tourists or resident foreigners. We are neighors to one another in as much as we share the same cultural backgrounds, color, creed, race and ideology.
Have you ever experienced helping or being helped by your neighbor in times of needs? How did you feel? How did the event affect your life? or touch you?
Most of the time, you feel great in helping others, the feeling of fulfilment is achieve. There are also times that you have receive help from your neighbors. This feelings move you and touch you that there are people outside your family who cares. I can still remember one event in my life that really showcase how our neighbor care for us! It was in the year 1993, I was only eight years old back then, when this accident happened. Half of our house was destroyed because of the "Blasting" its a term used for explosives used to cracked stones. My father was involved in stonecraft industry. To cut the story short, I thought it was the end of our life, I didn't remembered anything except that loud blast of explosion. Then, after I regain my conscious state, there I was being carried by the hands of our neighbor. Manong Jome saved me and my father from that shocking experienced. I am very thankful that we have a very caring neighbor, if not for my neighbor who knows what would happened to us back then.
Reflection:
Loving our neighbor means getting involved. It means stopping to care. It runs the risk of being misunderstood. It is never easy to give oneself in order to love the neighbor.
Definitely, we can also find thousand reasons, alibis, excuses if we don't really want to care, if we are not ready to get involved, if we don't want to be available. It takes a generous heart to go out of our way. We allow ourselves to be disturbed for a while in order to respond to a person's need.
Captured by: Vivo Lite Plus
